Grace under fire

Since our amazing and beautiful son came to us through adoption, God has literally taken my heart in his hands, lifted it up, turned it upside down and shaken out all its contents. As He retrieves all the pieces and begins to put them back, the way I see everything about parenting, children, adoption and orphans has changed.

My son has changed me. Completely. I am thankful that the tool God has currently chosen to refine me is such an adorable, energetic bundle of personality that melts my heart by running up and kissing me right on the lips, wet drool and all.

I was recently stung by words that a neighbor said to me in my living room, with my son just a few feet away. She was lamenting wanting another child but her husband worries about her age and the risk of having a child with special needs as she approaches 40. I brought up adoption. She would adopt, but her husband just “couldn’t love a child that was not his own.” I was happy Jonathan still does not catch a lot of what is said. I sat there and wondered how this would sound to him if he had understood it.

“I’m not as good as other people’s kids. Other people love their kids more when they aren’t adopted. Our family is not as good as other people’s families. There’s something wrong with me. I’m not worthy of love because I’m adopted.” Of course, none of these things were going through his mind. But they were going through mine. I was uncertain of how to elaborate with my neighbor, so all I said was, “I really don’t understand that.” She came to her husband’s defense then, saying she has other friends whose husbands feel “the same way.” The sad thing here is that she is not the first Christian to say this to me. This thought is prevalent among people in our churches today. Yet it is the antithesis of God and what He demonstrates in His Word.

I am very thankful our Heavenly Father does not have such a heart. Otherwise, He would never have “chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will…” (Ephesians 1:4-5). Long before own His Son was born, God Himself adopted, not only one child, but a whole nation of people. Then He referred to them as Israel, His firstborn son (Exodus 4:22). Jesus, He referred to as His Beloved Son (Matthew 3:17). Do you catch this? The children through adoption are called His firstborn son! It would take too long to elaborate on the significance of being a firstborn son in the Old Testament. Suffice it to say, God loves all his children. Those who are adopted hold just as a legitimate position as His very own Son, Jesus Christ. Somehow, this is either not really being conveyed, or it is not being conveyed loudly enough in our churches. Our former pastor, when he heard of our news to adopt, laughed and said, “There you go. Just adopt and you’ll get pregnant.” I’m sure he never meant anything by it. However, because I am overly sensitive to these types of things, what I heard was that adoption is the consolation prize until the real deal comes along. Somehow we are missing what our spiritual adoption first of all means to us and second, what it means in the physical realm when we choose to pray for, long for, and wait for a child with no genetic connection to us, whom we chose to embrace and give our name. To those who say that they couldn’t love a child who wasn’t “theirs” shows a true lack of understanding their own adoption in Christ. And it also, I believe, conveys a true selfishness that I am calling “DNA idolatry.” I know about this because God has hammered away at it in my own heart and life. DNA idolatry is loving our self to the point that we subconsciously begin to believe that only little copies of our self running around are deserving of our love. It is a lie. It is wrong. It is not mirrored in the Bible. It is most certainly not what God Himself has demonstrated to us in adopting us as His sons and daughters.

Our own journey to adoption was hastened through the pain of infertility. God has used infertility in my life just as He has used my son, as a tool to refine and redefine how I see Him, and how I see myself in relationship to Him. From the fires of infertility I have learned that there are much greater pains in this world. Like the pain of a child languishing in an orphanage overseas. Like the pain of a woman in an unexpected pregnancy. I have also learned that there are joys beyond infertility that could not be so appreciated had there not been such pain along the way. Like the joy of hearing my son, my true son, call me “mama.” Like the joy of grasping for the first time ever what my own adoption in Christ truly means.

There is much more to say but my little man just woke up from his nap. I am amazed and humbled by what I am learning through him. Now for the wisdom and grace to accurately apply it to people when they make such remarks as my neighbor!